My husband left my blue tent in the shed!
It’s my new one as well!
I only found out today.
Our shed is located several hundred miles away
at the top of a mammoth mountain range unreachable by car
and it will take several days to rescue it.
What if it’s gone all moldy?
What if it’s been nibbled on by small animals?
Should I divorce him?
* * * * *
I keep most all my other tents in the airing cupboard
where they stay nice and warm and dry until I find that I need to use a tent,
which is usually several times a day.
* * * * *
I have a big airing cupboard with plenty of room for towels and tents.
I don’t know why I have such a big airing cupboard.
I’ve always been lucky at life I guess.
I sometimes feel guilty that victims of earthquakes or tsunamis,
or the destitute in Africa or renters of efficiency apartments
don’t have a big airing cupboard and I do.
I’m not saying I’m better than them.
Just that I have a big airing cupboard and they don’t.
If I had one wish for the world, it would be that every last man
woman and child who wants a big airing cupboard could have one.
This is what I pray for every night when I am in one of my tents.
* * * * *
But I have a big airing cupboard and I dry washing in it.
That is the respectable thing to do with airing cupboards.
I also have scarecrows with sunflower heads and some unexploded bombs
we found in the harbor drying in there.
* * * * *
Most of my tents have lived in my airing cupboard for several years now
along with members of an artists’ colony. They get along reasonably well,
and I have no plans to change that arrangement anytime soon.
* * * * *
You’d be surprised how there is so much stuff that would be much happier to live in an airing cupboard than in a damp, cold shed. A lot of things. No just garden tools and old bicycles. I’d have to think probably most Lower East Side poets would be quite happy in there.
* * * * *
Our old tent lived in the shed, but it was encased in a watertight, animal-proof plastic box
and developed claustrophobia and ran away with the pruning shears. They’re doing well. They’re now married and send us Christmas cards every year from Tuscon.
* * * * *
There is a red tent which is in the attic.
I do not visit it as often as I should.
My roof has been leaking and the hatch to my attic isn’t easy to use.
Our lovely new bell tent lives in the utility room,
so that I can pat it affectionately every day
on my way to the washing machine.
My yellow tent lives on the top shelf
of the built in cupboard in the spare bedroom.
The rest of the cupboard is occupied by an old hobo named “Rusty.”
I keep most other living things in the cellar but
none of my tents will EVER be allowed down there
for OBVIOUS reasons.
* * * * *
In case you’re wondering
I’ll have you know I eat sausage rolls and drink fruit shoots.
I don’t bow to man pressure or other peoples ideas of what’s respectable and what’s not.
(hrrumph!)
I have a fat passage as well
according to my silent angel.
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Found language from an online chat board, slightly modified and rearranged.
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/camping/1055886-O-M-G-dh-left-my-tent-in-the-shed/AllOnOnePage
